Seawatch delivers another pallid harrier!

This gannet gave us an excellent close flyby, I don't think it was carrying nesting material! Unfortunately I suspect a hook-and-line are involved.

With Number 2 in tow and a reasonable westerly in progress we headed out to Yttre Kattvik to camp out in the car and get some seawatching done. It was rather quiet for seabirds though with just four gannets, four little gulls and an unidentified skua through in just over three hours. Wildfowl were on the move though and small flocks of wigeon produced a total of five hidden pintail. Strangely a brent goose spent most of the session floating offshore. Dunlin (40) were on the move in a small-scale way and four grey plovers also headed west.

But it was the raptors which really stole the show with two kestrels, two merlin and two peregrines in-off and then the big one. I was playing about with Number 2 when I looked around to discover a large ginger raptor was heading straight for us. I got it in the bins just as it hit the beach and turned west - another 1K pallid harrier. Number 2 giggled as I tried unsuccessfully to get my camera out in time. Well at least I thought of trying to get a photo this time. Maybe my fourth of the autumn will make a digital image! Just a superb encounter and ridiculously close yet again. Do pallid harriers have less fear of man than other harrier species?